Archive for March, 2012

White Rock Local Market is a 501c(3) tax exempt organization. All donations are tax deductible. Joining White Rock Local Market as a member means contributing to its sustainability. There are plenty of reasons to support WRLM, and it’s not just about the healthy, locally grown and handcrafted products found nowhere else. In the four years since we began, WRLM has transformed an otherwise barren parking lot into a vibrant celebration of our community and neighborhoods.

We have incubated small businesses, provided crucial support to organic farmers, funded field trips for kids, supported our area public and private schools, and introduced a successful SNAP/Lone Star Card food stamp program. These programs are just the beginning – but we need your help.

For our 2012 season, we are expanding cooking demonstrations, offering workshops from organic gardening pros, partnering with area public and private schools, and that is just a start. If you have benefited from this non-profit market, consider a small donation. Help us grow our programs and transform into a sustainable institution.

Click the DONATE button and make a donation. We will contact you for the rest. Show your love!

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History is sketchy when it comes to chili. I just read a folktale that suggests that chili may have originated as a way to dispose of Spanish Conquistadors. Also, its consumption may have been a way of justifying the actions of Billy the Kid. Around our house, we make chili as a guarantee that the kids will eat and enjoy a home-cooked meal. Chili can be calculated carefully by and enthusiast, or desperately concocted by a busy American family throwing in everything but the kitchen sink.

Whatever the reason for chili, we know that chili is as seasonal as it gets. Chili blends local and preserved peppers and spices, marauding (ex: local, grass-fed) cattle, the dried beans from storage and the preserved tomatoes from last summer’s bumper crop under the Texas sun. In March, our summer harvests are still growing and we need to eat from the pantry. What better way to celebrate than to throw together a pot of early spring chili?

We would love your entry in our March 24 Chili Cook-Off. There will be prizes and bragging rights and you will be supporting our local economy. Details here: ENTER TODAY!

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On to Year Four! White Rock Local Market begins its fourth season Saturday, March 10, welcoming veteran vendors as well as some new. We’re excited to start a new “growers only” policy where farmers will only bring what they’ve grown themselves, or what they can accurately label from other farmers. We’re excited to invite backyard farmers to join us at our Gardeners Table – no harvest is too small! We welcome new vendors Latte Da Dairy, Three Happy Cows, Citas Salsa and Corked in Texas. And you can’t get more local than newcomers Hypnotic Donuts and Noble Coyote Coffee Roasters – both from East Dallas.

Organic growers Farmer Jones Plants and Produce, Texas Worm Ranch and Good Earth Organics are back, as well as Kitchen Pride Mushrooms. Later in the spring we’ll be joined by Rae Lilli Farm, Sachse Heritage Farms, Larken Farms and Lightsey Farms. Juha Ranch returns with grassfed beef, chicken, lamb, pork and eggs; Homestead Heritage will be there with their wide variety of meats and cheeses. Eagle Mountain Cheese, Grapevine Grains, The Tamale Company, Lucido’s Pasta, and Texas Olive Ranch. Empire Baking and Village Baking Company will be there, along with Tough Cookie Vegan Bakery and newcomers The Bread Crumb and EMA Baking.

And, of course, March 10 will be our Everything Market, complete with fabulous art, clothes, jewelry, toys, furniture and more – all made by North Texans.

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Do you think you make blue ribbon chili? Are you ready to put it to the test to see how yours stacks up against your neighbor’s at the White Rock Local Market chili cook-off? What are you waiting for? Let the fun begin!

Entry fee is $20 per contestant. Space is limited. Deadline for entry is March 23, 2012.